Formats: PC

Publisher: Lighthouse Interactive

Reviewed By: David Valjalo

Price: £14.99

[ratings]

Viewed as Rhiannon’s cousin – a similarly low-budget point-and-clicker with a spooky filter – Barrow Hill is faster on its feet and a dash more confident in terms of narrative. The title screams into motion with the familiar horror-movie trope of an abandoned petrol station – albeit in Cornwall – and continues on a path of kitschy thrills from then on. The puzzles, whilst logical and well marked for the player, are basic and quickly tiresome.

The story of an ancient burial site and an ill-fated night in the woods with the added hokum of missing artefacts, Barrow Hill’s tale becomes tedious soon after the opening act.

A more immediate, fast-paced instalment in the genre, Barrow Hill treads familiar ground with a spring in its step and at times makes the most of its old-fashioned and rudimentary situation. The puzzles, whilst logical and well marked for the player, are basic and linear and as you navigate the clichés and tick the boxes, you can’t help pondering the absence of the genre’s famed sense of humour and grand adventure.

Credit must be given to the art design, if only for its budgeted regurgitation of old-rope. The intimacy of the setting is doubtless intended to conjure atmosphere and claustrophobia, but it takes minutes before the bland back-drops grate on the modern user and the suspension of disbelief becomes too much to maintain. Perhaps it’s a sign of the times – and the technology – but the bottom line is that the supernatural horror genre has new, more full bodied poster children with budget price tags.

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